If you live in Chatham, then you know that our weekly Farmer’s Market is the place to be on Saturday mornings between 8 a.m. and 1 p.m.!  The market allows for farm fresh produce, fresh Jersey Shore fish, locally produced eggs, meats, artisan cheese and bread to be at your fingertips, only a few steps from your Chatham home.  Other exciting market finds are the beekeeper, cooking and gardening displays and demonstrations, cultural performances, and the opportunity to mingle with friends and neighbors from surrounding New Jersey midtown direct towns.  The volunteers and manager Janice Piccolo of the Chatham Farmer’s Market are always looking for ways to enhance your experience, so speak up if you have an idea or would like to be a part of the planning of this fun, community event!

Speaking of excitement, on August 1^st, our local Chatham Farmers’ Market was named as one of three finalists in the national contest for a new barn.  You can help Chatham Farmers’ Market win an open-air, post & beam market style 24-ft x 36-ft barn built by Yankee Barn Homes , valued at $80,000, simply by clicking here and casting your vote for Chatham before August 15^th at 11:59 a.m.  Be sure to tell your friends and neighbors who live in New Jersey, as you can only vote once.  The Great Barn Giveaway is sponsored by The American Farmland Trust, the Farmers Market Coalition and bark maker W.H. Silverstein Inc., as they celebrate local economic development and healthy living.

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Go GREEN, Go paperless!

Things have been hopping around here in New Jersey, lots of contracts being written. And, with every Real Estate transaction there is a lot of paperwork but, I’m learning, that doesn’t have to mean a lot of PAPER!

As part of our “GREEN-ing”, we have tried to implement paperless transactions where ever possible. Emailing, Faxing and Online listing databases and transaction management calendars, as well as shared online files have certainly paved the way to reducing the amount of paper used. Before the online MLS, each agent had an MLS book, full of all of the active listing for a given area (currently there are 457 homes available in: Maplewood, South Orange, Summit and Millburn alone). What a waste of paper!

When I schedule Buyer Appointments, I print out as few (if any) copies of the MLS listing sheets as possible. Instead, my clients and I review online listing and narrow down our home selections online. And, I have noticed that my clients no longer want to take every piece of paper that the Listing Agents leave out. Savvy buyer’s think: “I can pull up everything on my phone…why carry around a bunch of papers and kill more trees.” Love That!

I have a client whose profession has caused him to transfer locations (and homes) 7 times in the past 15 years. He and his wife have actually purchased 2 of these homes completely online – not having stepped foot into them until they were the owners.

As a GREEN REALTOR there are two sites are the backbone of my GREEN paper (less) work trail: NJAR.com which provides Realtors with access to online copies of all forms needed for any Real Estate Transaction and Docusign.com which provides the ability to securely obtain digital signatures (considered legal). I am sure they are not the only game in town, but I am really happy with their product.

When all is said and done we have clear, legible documents that everyone can read, because they haven’t been copied/scanned/faxed a million time and you didn’t have to schlep around town (wasting gas) getting original signatures. Best of all you avoid the mounds of wasted paper copies along the way.

So next time you go out with me to look at a house, let’s bring our smartphones and view the listings online.

Paper copies are sooooo last year!

Tracy Freeman, REALTOR GREEN
Buyer Specialist

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Week 3 of my “Greener Evolution”.

I was stopped at a light at the corner of Morris Tpke. and Millburn Ave. when four teenage girls, say 14 or 15 years old, nearly gave the “MOM”in me a heart attack. Two of the girls dangerously ignored the cross signal and road their bikes across the busy street narrowly avoiding oncoming traffic. The other two waited until it was slightly safer to ride across, but if any of their mothers had been there..OY!

In our area the number of residents who are thinking along the same lines seems to be hitting a critical mass. On July 21st a vote on this issue is scheduled at the Millburn Township Committee Meeting. If passed, it will provide bike lanes and safer bike travel around a portion of South Mountain Reservation from Brookside Drive to Ridgewood Road. The project is supposed to include striping along Glen Avenue, road markers with the bicycle symbol, and kiosks with information about the path and signs. In addition to running along Glen Avenue, the path would link to downtown Millburn on Lackawanna Place. Now this is something everyone (especially all of us Greenies) would love to see happen!

Even more exciting news! From what I understand, our other midtown train towns are in various stages of their own Bike Path projects. Imagine being able to ride a bike from town to town along the train line. Maplewood to Millburn to Short Hills Station to Summit and to Chatham! How cool would that be? For our environment and our thighs!

I will keep you posted on the results of the meeting. If all goes well, the project in Millburn could be completed by the Fall!

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This week I completed the first portion of my GREEN Designation Course for REALTORS. And it has made me think. Where do I fall on the “Greenie” spectrum, and can I do more. I think I am like most other people,  I am neither a “True Believer” nor a “Skeptic”, nor am I eco-chic (unless I find something cool and GREEN at TJ Maxx). I am somewhere in the middle – a “lifestyle” environmentalist.

As a person, I think green in good. As a home owner, I think an energy efficienct home is good. As a mom, I think Sustainability is good. And, I thought I was contributing a decent amount to the green movement. I recycle a lot, I use reusable shopping bags religiously, I only give my children Organic Milk and I shop locally and organically whenever possible.

But, I don’t or didn’t ever stop to really look around my home and examine how green it is.

After two intense days under Mimi Weisinger’s “tutelage” my eyes are open (wider) and I want to do better. Following in the footsteps of the start of the green movement in commerical real estate. I am focusing on the bottom line and over the next 52 weeks vow to make my home more energy efficient and more GREEN.

I live in a 1920′s colonial in Maplewood NJ. So it’s not like I can start from scratch, say by finding a brownfield, remediating the contamination and building a LEED home. No, my steps will have to be more home specific to my existing home and more calculated to fit within our budget.

My husband and I have already done two things to improve our homes “Greeness”. 1.) We have had professionals removed as much of the lead paint from the exterior as possible and repainted it ironically enough green (neither for the movement, nor for our beloved Philadelphia E-A-G-L-E-S, as some of our family and friends may think), 2.) We have replaced all 27 of our old, single-pane windows on the first and second floors with thermal pane/low E windows – which have the added benefit of opening and closing. Yay for us!

So, what’s next. Each week I will set a goal for myself. Our road map of baby steps in moving towards a greener home. This week’s goal will be to evaluate what needs to be done, what we can afford to do and then create a priority list for the next 52 weeks. 365 days from now our Maplewood Home will be greener. Look out Ed Begley Jr. my carbon footprint is getting smaller too!

Feel free to email me with your ideas and wish us luck.

Tracy Freeman

Buyer Specialist, Sue Adler Team

eMail: TracyFreemanRealtor@gmail.com

Mobile: 917.604.5735

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